Help! My VOIP Provider’s Music On Hold Sucks!

Like a kid on Christmas morning who anxiously awaits opening their gift, you have a smile from ear to ear as you get excited to open the box of your new VOIP phone. Your hurriedly open the box, set it up and now you can’t wait to begin taking advantage of some real cost savings on your telecom and also get to enjoy its feature rich options.

However, it’s not long before most businesses who decide to take the leap of cutting the cord from a traditional landline soon discover  – you’re torturing your callers with the pre-selected music on hold of your hosted voip system that sounds like funeral parlor music. Now as you dig a little deeper, you see that your provider has maybe a half dozen other pre-selected music on hold tracks for you to use, but once again they either sound like cheesy 80’s porn music or are tinny sounding and choppy.

Is this really the impression of your brand you want to convey to callers on hold? Funeral parlor or cheesy sounding 80’s style porn music, and driving callers crazy with choppy, tinny sounding audio? For some businesses, maybe any ol’ music will do, but if you take your brand seriously — then probably not.

In fact,  Tony Hsieh – the hip, iconoclastic, and widely-admired CEO of Zappos understands that every phone call leaves a deep impression.  In his best selling book  Delivering Happiness, Hsieh says:

“As unsexy and low-tech as it may sound, our belief is that the telephone is one of the best branding devices out there. You have the customer’s undivided attention for five to ten minutes, and if you get the interaction right, what we’ve found is that the customer remembers the experience for a very long time and tells his friends about it. Don’t ignore the telephone when you define (or redefine) your communication strategy. The telephone is your chance to make an impression that e-mail or Social Media just can’t match.”

Hosted VIOP providers are in the VOIP telecom business, and not the music on hold or audio branding business! So, not too much thought or concern goes into what your callers hear on hold. The silver lining to this voip music on hold problem is, that when using hosted providers such as ShoreTel, Ring Central, Grasshopper, 8 x 8 or any of the thousands of others out there,  allow the end-user the ability to change the pre-selected music on hold by uploading custom audio files via a web portal for a better music on hold and brand experience.

Finding the right music on hold strategy can be difficult, and this is why you should rely on the expertise of a professional music on hold and message company who are audio branding & marketing specialists. A reputable music on hold service provider will have an extensive library or licensed music, and will capture the essence of your brand and culture by matching it with the right music.

But, matching the right style of music to brand is only the beginning. Playing strictly music is not the best on hold strategy. Why? There are no messages playing to engage the mind of your callers. Research supports that music alone is not as effective as callers who listen to music on hold and messages combined.

Leverage their captive attention by filling the time with more than elevator music. Fill it with your elevator pitch instead! Capitalize on this inbound marketing opportunity by deploying on hold message and music programming to disseminate important information to callers, timely promotions and events while at the same time caring for your brand and providing a positive first impression to callers on hold.

If you want to improve the bottom line of your business and your customer’s perception of your business in addition to having custom branded hold music and messages – you should also consult with your on-hold services provider for custom auto attendant recordings for your telephone prompts including: Day, night, and holiday greetings, Call distribution prompts (“Press 1 for sales, Press 2 for support”), Departmental messages, sales messages, etc. When you have your voip systems attendant greetings done in a clear, pleasant and professional voice, you can  boost custom service quality  at our business.